Isocrates ›Peri tou zeugous‹: An Encomium of Alcibiades (Trends in Classics - Supplementary Volumes, 204)

The legendary Alcibiades, the renowned Athenian general, cut a charismatic yet enigmatic figure, glorious and provocative, attractive and ambiguous. Isocrates’ Peri tou zeugous (On the Team of Horses; 16), from the early 4th century BC, concerns a legal case against Alcibiades’ son, the younger Alcibiades, regarding the misappropriation by his father of a four-horse chariot that he had used to win the Olympic Games in 416 BC., but essentially functions as an encomium of his father’s activities. The commentary at hand stresses the particularity of Peri tou zeugous as an embedded encomium; it systematically recognises the encomiastic topoi and establishes the place of the speech in the history of the epideictic genre. The speech demonstrates that apology and encomium could coexist, confirming the formative role of the genos dikanikon in shaping the prose encomium in the 4th century BC. A particular focus is placed on the tension between the exceptional individual―exemplified by Alcibiades―and the political community. Isocrates, fully aware of his democratic audience, strategically highlights Alcibiades’ alignment with traditional polis values while simultaneously acknowledging his extraordinary nature. Read more